


Cotard

by writeside



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cotard's Delusion, Death, Gen, Kinda, POV Second Person, Psychosis, Self-Harm, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-29
Updated: 2017-04-29
Packaged: 2018-10-25 05:44:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10757922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writeside/pseuds/writeside
Summary: Cotard's Delusion/Syndrome, also known as 'Walking Corpse Syndrome,' is the rare disease where the person believes they are dead/have died/are missing organs/are rotting.AU where Schizo-spectrum Jehan struggles with Cotard's Delusion, as told through a series of conversations with Grantaire and moments Jehan realized they were dead.





	Cotard

It’s hard work being dead. It’s hard to explain it to people. 

 

“I killed myself.” You tell Grantaire. He's your best friend. He needs to know.

“How?” He asks.

“With a razor. There was blood everywhere.” It stained your bed. 

“When did you die?” he asks. 

 

You attend your college’s Lavender Graduation to honor your queer and trans friends who are graduating. It’s a small ceremony, you recognize everyone there. Combeferre gives a speech and says “I’d like to remember everyone who couldn’t make it” and you are shocked when they don't call your name. You look around. These are your friends. They should be remembering you. Why don’t they want to remember that you couldn’t make it?

You see blood covering your arms. This is awkward. You were wearing such a nice dress. It’s coming from your wrists. You slit them, remember? There was blood everywhere. There _is_ blood everywhere. 

_Remember?_

 

“You were the one who found me,” you tell Grantaire.

“I found you?”

“In my bed. No one else went in my room. Except Etoile.” Etoile is your cat. “You came to check on me, though. And you found me.”

“When did you die?” he asks.

 

You sit on your feet for three hours staring at the table in front of you. You do not move. You do not talk. You do not even think, you simply sit and stare. After an hour the table ceases to exist. This is fine. You do not exist either. 

Grantaire comes to rouse you. “Are you okay?” he asks and you smile and nod. “Stand up,” he says and you do, but you wobble. 

Your feet have fallen asleep. You look down at them and try to wiggle your toes. Your toes are purple with lack of blood flow.

That’s what your corpse looked like. Its toes were purple. There was no blood flow.

_There is blood everywhere._

 

“When did you die?” Grantaire asks.

“What?”

“When did you die, Jehan?”

“I. I dont - “

“How long have you been dead?”

“A - a while now?”

“And you’ve been living here the whole time?”

“Well, not _living_ here. But. Yeah. I’ve been, I’ve been haunting myself.”

“But when did you die?” he asks.

 

Grantaire asks you if you have eaten and you wonder what sort of game he’s playing. Corpses don’t eat. “When’s the last time you ate?” he asks and sounds worried enough that you give it a thought. You don’t remember eating recently. You stopped thinking about it after you died. You haven’t felt hunger in weeks. 

You tell Grantaire not to worry. He still looks worried. You smile and remind Grantaire that dead people don’t really need food.

You aren’t really dead, though, are you? Something’s off. You haunt your apartment and your life and everything stays the same. You aren’t sure how you’ll find your closure with nothing changing but you aren’t sure what else to do. 

That was always you problem, when you were alive. You never knew what to do. You killed yourself just to shake things up and now here you are, dead and still doing everything the same. 

You ask your brain what you should do. Your brain tells you to die. This is pretty normal, but it leaves you confused regardless. 

You tell your brain that you have already killed yourself, and that you were talking about eating. Your brain tells you to die. 

_There is blood everywhere._

 

“Why aren’t you mourning me?” You ask Grantaire. “Why doesn’t my death mean anything to you?”

“When did you die, Jehan?” he asks.

 

You knew someone once with Cotard’s Delusion. The Walking Corpse Syndrome. “I’m dead” they said and you had laughed because they were alive right in front of you, then apologized when they kept repeating “I’m dead I'm dead I'm dead.”

You look at yourself now. Your arms are bleeding. Your toes are purple. “I’m dead” you tell your reflection and the mirror says it back. 

 

_But when did you die?_

**Author's Note:**

> Been struggling with good ol cotard lately so i wrote some fic to cope. so sorry this is super self indulgent.


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